Open source military analysis, strategic thinking, and imagery interpretation. To locate Google Earth placemark files for download, select the label "Google Earth Placemark" from the keywords menu. Comments are welcome and encouraged.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

I&A's Six Month Review

It occurs to me that I&A has now existed as a PDF version for about six months! With that in mind, I set my brain to work and I came to a few decisions about some of the PDF topics earlier today.

First off, the August air defense feature will cover Taiwan's SAM network. This will be an updated and expanded version of what I did here a while back. I've got a few updates and new site locations, and will rehash the old information to expand it and clarify a few things.

Additionally, future nationwide air defense topics may or may not showcase an individual nation. There are some clusters of nations where SAM sites are few and far between, predominantly in Africa. I plan to do a lot of them at once in a large feature. Or, they may all technically be listed separately, but I'll do a bunch at once for a given issue.

I'm still looking for additional content areas. Air Defense, Strategic Warfare, Facility Analysis...all are great focus areas, but I can always use more. That'll enable me to broaden the scope of each issue. So, if you have any ideas, let me know. Or better yet, write one and send it in!

This brings me to my next point: contributors. I'm extremely grateful for the effort put forth by I&A's current contributors, and hope they will continue to sumbit articles in the future. That being said, I'm certainly open to incorporating new authors into the system. Articles don't even need to have an imagery theme; the current issue has an article describing the PLAAF's new BVR AAM, for example. As long as it relates to either a military theme, or an application of imagery technology or analysis, it's more than welcome. You can even take a stab at the Links or Reading List content areas if you wish. So, if you have any ideas, contact me and we'll get talking.

As it stands now, the PDF has survived the first six months, and speaking for myself I'm definitely pleased with the results. My only two major gripes at this juncture are that 1) I could really use a bit more graphic design brainpower to, I don't know, give it a decent cover (and maybe an official I&A logo?), and 2) I need to try and make things more consistent in terms of length. Adding more features or additional topics in a given content area like Facility Analysis will help that, and I'm working on it. I'm also working on number 1, but don't hold your breath on seeing results anytime soon. Frankly you guys are lucky I can generate profile views of weapon systems, actual serious graphic design is another beast altogether!

That about sums everything up. Hopefully you're as pleased with everything as I am to this point. And if you aren't, drop me a line. As I mention in each issue, comments are always welcome and encouraged!

Oh, you may have noticed that the SAM Site Overview actually got updated yesterday...don't worry, it's still an active project and will always remain so. It's just that fewer and fewer new sites are being found, making it less important to update it every month when only, say, ten new EW sites have been ID'ed.

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